Claire’s mother is surprisingly greedy, given how thin she’s become. A greedy little bird. She pecks and pecks at biscuits all day. She likes her glass of sweet Chardonnay at night. Claire sends Patience through with the biscuits, a small offering, a treat, to cement the bond.

‘You’re still here,’ her mother says when Claire emerges. There are crumbs in the hollows of her chest. ‘When’re you off? You shouldn’t keep all those little Dutchmen waiting. Watch out for them, though. They’re naughty. They’re very naughty on the Continent.’

‘I’ll call you when I land.’

‘We’re all the same size lying down!’

When Claire has gone off in her cheap little car – though not without sitting behind the wheel for five minutes, in full view of the neighbours, like a sack of potatoes – Jacqueline turns to Patience and examines her pale hair, her light, smooth skin like a twenty-year-old’s. Patience, in turn, seems to be examining Jacqueline. No surprise there: Jacqueline has always been a striking woman. People feel compelled to look. Why shouldn’t Patience feel compelled too?

‘You could call me sensei,’ Jacqueline says, inspired. ‘Do you know what that means? It means teacher.’

‘It also means person born before another, did you know that?’

‘I was born before you, wasn’t I?’

‘Technically,’ Patience says, ‘I was not born.’

‘Oh, so what. So you were put together from a kit. You weren’t and then you were – that’s being born. Do you know where I was born?’

‘In Crystal Palace.’

‘Wrong! That’s where I lived. Did Claire tell you that? I lived in Crystal Palace; I was born in Shirley Oaks. My grandfather was one of the firemen who put out the Crystal Palace fire. The great fire, when it all burned down. He was only young then, and really handsome, my grandfather. My father was, too. Really, really handsome men. My grandfather went in and rescued one of the office ladies. She’d inhaled a lot of smoke, but she lived. She was grateful to him all her life. I think she loved him. He lost all the hair off his right arm bringing her out, but it grew back much thicker than before. Like a kiwi fruit.’

‘That is extraordinary.’

‘Is it? He was just my Grandpa to me. Imagine if he’d married that woman! She was a nightmare. Completely hopeless. She used to send him a card on his birthday, a card at Christmas, even after my father was born. Henry, I remember you always. He wasn’t a fireman then. He went into finance. He got absolutely filthy stinking rich. You wouldn’t believe the way my father was raised. He had butter every day, even when there was rationing. If you’ve got money, you can get whatever you like. It’s all gone now, obviously.’

‘May I ask what happened?’

‘What do you think? What always happens. Crooks.’